So says Translink Chief Operating Officer Doug Kelsey, on word the Compass Card program still needs some work before it can be rolled out to the general public.

He says the cost of stamping out the glitches won’t boost the cost above the current 194 million dollars.

“The repairing or the fixing of the bus validator issue will be the responsibility of the contractor, Cubic, and that includes not only fixing it, but the financial side that goes with it. The taxpayer has already paid for this issue, and there is not more to go.”

He says we need to take the “long view” here and not fixate on this month-by-month.

George Heyman says the operating costs will exceed what will be saved in fare evasion.

He says there is a better way.

“I think that if there was increased human presence in terms of Translink police and security, it’s both a deterrent to fare evasion, which is what this was supposed to be all about, and it also increases security of people passing through the station. The gates do nothing to prevent robberies or sexual harassment, those require people.”

Heyman says almost 200-million dollars has been spent and the implementation delayed by over a year.

This bloody mess started with the missing 2million from fare cheaters and people here complaining about the cheats and nearly wanted a firing squad to stop it! You gave these unelected people the mandate to fleece us a little more You asked for it and you got it! Its not working well but some will say in do time they will fix it! Just in time for the next election